A meeting of theater minds

Barry Edelstein (left) of the Old Globe and Christopher Ashley of La Jolla Playhouse guide the artistic missions of two theaters that are not only San Diego's biggest by far, but among the most high-profile in the nation.
— Crissy Pascual / Infinite Media Works

Barry Edelstein (left) of the Old Globe and Christopher Ashley of La Jolla Playhouse guide the artistic missions of two theaters that are not only San Diego's biggest by far, but among the most high-profile in the nation.
/ Crissy Pascual / Infinite Media Works

Some 25 years ago, Christopher Ashley and Barry Edelstein were two hungry young directors finding their way in the New York theater scene. Though the pair crossed paths now and then, they went on to forge distinctly different careers.

Edelstein, a Rhodes scholar and dedicated Shakespearean, became artistic chief of off-Broadway’s Classic Stage Company and then head of the heavyweight Public Theater’s Shakespeare Initiative.

Ashley, a Yale grad with a talent for musical theater (among other forms), became a busy freelance director and eventual Broadway regular, directing "Memphis" to a Tony Award as best musical in 2010.

Now their lives have converged again, as artistic directors of by far the two biggest institutions in a thriving San Diego theater scene. Ashley has been La Jolla Playhouse’s artistic leader since 2007; Edelstein took on the same job at the Old Globe Theatre late last year.

While the fact our city hosts two of the most renowned regional theaters in the country might seem to set up a natural rivalry, Ashley and Edelstein insist the relationship between the two is much more about cooperation and mutual respect.

In a wide-ranging conversation with the U-T (excerpted here), the pair, who are both 48, talked about their institutions’ work and how it fits into the larger San Diego theater landscape.

The chat fell barely two weeks before the Tony Awards (taking place in New York next Sunday), which have honored both the Globe and Playhouse in the past, although neither theater has a significant presence this year.

Q: Do you feel as though you bring a certain shared sensibility to your two theaters because of where and when you both came up?

Barry Edelstein (left) has been artistic chief of the Old Globe since late last year; Christopher Ashley joined La Jolla Playhouse in 2007.— Crissy Pascual / Infinite Media Works

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Barry Edelstein (left) has been artistic chief of the Old Globe since late last year; Christopher Ashley joined La Jolla Playhouse in 2007.
/ Crissy Pascual / Infinite Media Works

Ashley: He’s much classier than I am. (Laughs.) I like to hang out in low culture more than he does. But I think the ’80s were really formative for people roughly our age.

Edelstein: It was a really interesting moment in New York when we were both arriving. It was one of those moments when Broadway was on a down (slope). I remember periods when there were 10 empty Broadway theaters, you know? (Now) Broadway casts a massive shadow in New York, in a way that I’m not sure was true when we were coming up.

Ashley: I also feel that when I got to New York, the AIDS epidemic was a huge fact of life in theater. There were so many memorial services every week. So many young people were passing away. It was such a dominant feature of life in the ’80s.

Edelstein: The other thing is Times Square hadn’t been cleaned up. Or whatever it’s been — I’m not sure “cleaned up” is the right term. But it was the old Times Square then. Forty-Second Street between Seventh and Eighth was a place you passed through as quickly as you could.

Ashley: I was mugged with a comb on 42nd Street between Seventh and Eighth. Somebody put a comb up to me and said, “Give me all your money!” And I said, “I think that’s a comb.” He said, “Oh, you got me!”

Edelstein: Certainly at the time we came up, you went to Manhattan as an artist. It was possible to live there. You get a couple of roommates and a dump in the East Village.

Ashley: Now it seems you can straight-facedly say that people go to San Diego. There’s such a vibrant theater community going on here, with so many young artists forming new theaters. And so many midsized theaters coming into their maturity. It seems increasingly a great place to move to be an actor. There’s an artistically satisfying life to be found, and increasingly a living to be made. You don’t have to go to L.A. or New York. It’s an exciting time in San Diego’s history.

Q: It used to be more of a one-way pipeline of shows sent from San Diego to Broadway. Do you feel things have reached sort of a critical mass where not just plays but people are heading back in our direction?

Ashley: I do think San Diego, partly because of the exciting work that was done here in the ‘80s and ‘90s, is a really desirable place. I jumped at coming here.

Edelstein: Me too.

Ashley: It was one of the theaters I wanted to run the most.

Edelstein: In a heartbeat, you know? I’ve not been here long enough to be able to speak about it authoritatively, nor am I willing to place myself at the center of a trend, God forbid. But God knows, if what happens here in the next period makes this place more of a center for the American theater, and the center of gravity shifts in this direction, wow, I’ll be the most excited guy.

As you know, the TCG (Theatre Communications Group) Conference is coming here next year. That’s huge. And hats off to the Playhouse, who really were the driving force behind that.

Ashley: That is a great example of the real collaboration between the Globe and the Playhouse. I mean, both staffs worked beautifully in concert and really hard to make that happen.

Edelstein: And that’s a great thing. The eyes of the national theater community will be on the city.

Q: You’ve talked about there not really being a sense of competition between your theaters. But even if you’re not necessarily trying to compete, isn’t there at least a tug of war, in that you both could be trying to land the same artists or projects?

Edelstein: I don’t feel there’s a tug of war. We’ve got Rick Elice (of the Playhouse-launched “Jersey Boys” and “Peter and the Starcatcher”) coming with a new musical (“Dog and Pony”), and what I like about it is there’s no sense that, “You can’t have him, he’s a loyal Playhouse artist!” It’s not that. We’re on the same playing field in American theater.

I just like the idea that San Diego is the thing that’s in these artists’ minds, and not one house or the other, you know? It’s fantastic that Rick understands that there’s a San Diego audience for a new work of musical theater, that makes him say, “I want to develop my work there.” It’s bigger than either the Globe or La Jolla Playhouse.

Ashley: I really agree with that. I feel that many times, an artist who’s working on something new will say to me, I’m really interested in trying that out for the first time, in reading my first audience in San Diego. Because there’s a sense the audience here has seen a lot of theater, is really well educated, is savvy and generous. Which is a hard combination to come by.

I think both the Globe and the Playhouse are very visible, but we’re in a community of theaters that certainly includes the Rep, which does extraordinary work, and that includes an extraordinary number of small and midsized theaters. So we’re doing our work within a context of a real community of artists, and an audience that is at the Globe one night and the Playhouse the next, but is then going to get down to Cygnet, and to Diversionary, and to Ion.

Q: On both of your theaters’ websites, there’s a tally of shows that have gone on to Broadway. Do you feel as though that’s a way you measure the theaters against each other?

Ashley: I don’t.

Edelstein: No, we just don’t.

Ashley: There’s no question that there’s audience excitement about when a show goes on to have a future life. And I’m excited when a show goes on to a future life — whether it’s Broadway, or a tour, or it gets published and regional theaters and schools can do it. It’s one of the things you hope for when you make a new piece — and that different people will interpret it and rediscover it for years.

But I don’t feel as though anybody I know at the Globe or the Playhouse measures themselves that way.

Edelstein: I just know that we don’t. And just statistically speaking, we’re producing 15 shows a year. So if we were to measure our success by the number that have actually made it to Broadway, we wouldn’t have succeeded very well. (Laughs) We’re running nonprofit institutions that have missions that are about serving a community. The Broadway part of it folds into it to the extent it continues to serve that community. So when the shows are exciting and wonderful, then they’re right on mission. And the future life is gravy. But that’s not at all what we’re aiming at.

(Still), it’s a boasting point, and we have our Regional Theater Tony sitting in a nice vitrine when everybody walks into the Globe, so they see it.

Ashley: Vitrine, good word!

Edelstein: There’s no question that it bestows a kind of imprimatur on the place that we like to boast of. But it’s not what either of us thinks when we wake up in the morning: “How am I going to get to Broadway today?”

Ashley: I’ve spent some real time in the last six years here thinking about the reverse, which is how do you get the national spotlight really centered on San Diego and La Jolla? For the Playhouse, the (“Without Walls” and “DNA” new-play) festivals have been the main answer I’ve come up with. I certainly think the Balboa Park 2015 celebration has a real shot at that.

Edelstein: And as a newcomer to the city, I will say, that’s one of the things that has really excited me. I’m hearing an awful lot of people talking about San Diego stepping into the national spotlight. I’m hearing a lot, when I meet people for the first time, about a sense in the air that the city is about to take a big step.

Q: Is play development going to continue to be a key priority at both theaters?

Edelstein: I’m at the beginning of the spot where Chris was six years ago. I mean (speaking to Ashley), the work you’ve done building a system for developing new work is amazing. It’s a story that everybody in the country should be telling, about what you’ve managed to build here. The DNA Series, Page to Stage – just a real sense of robust (development), from reading to workshop to some kind of production.

I came from one at the Public that I thought was state of the art. And this is absolutely in that league. And I’m sitting here looking at, OK, the Globe needs to get on that track. And saying, OK, it’s possible to do that in five years. Chris has shown me.

I don’t know what ours will turn out to be like in five years. One thing I want to be make sure we do is to say, how can we complement what’s going on there? Not duplicate it, and not compete with it. But what’s the work that remains that we can contribute that’ll again make San Diego a much more compelling destination for writers who want to see their work produced?

So that’s total inspiration to me, to watch what you have built, and how successful it is. And if any of your funders want to come and help out …

Ashley: Audiences and donors get so excited about new work. Some of it is that you get to peek all the way behind the curtain, right? It’s the process that is fascinating to people.

I think it’s part of the same excitement people in San Diego feel when they see something for the first time – when they go to the Globe and see (the Broadway-bound musical) "Gentleman’s Guide," and then think, "Oh, that’s going on to have this extraordinary life, and I got to see it first – I got to see it be born."

The idea of seeing theater be born is very exciting to audiences, and very exciting to funders too.

Ashley: It is. Did I use marketing-speak? Hopefully it’s because I actually mean it, too. (Laughs.)

Q: Is local casting and artistic hiring becoming more of a firm priority as well?

Edelstein: You can’t develop new work unless you’ve got an acting community that’s resonant. I think we’re going to see more and more of that happen at the Globe in the years ahead, because there’s a lot of talent here.

The design talent really is first rate. (There are) a lot of wonderful actors, and a lot of really wonderful designers.

That’s partly the universities, too, because the way those artists make it work is through teaching jobs, and the fact you’ve got great universities with design programs in them is a big part of that.

Ashley: I think increasingly, too, artists are coming out of the (universities) and choosing to stay here. I think for a long time, L.A. and New York were irresistible – they were just magnets that sucked everybody out of school, and everybody would pick one and go to it.

I think designers and writers and directors and stage managers are coming out of these programs and increasingly saying, wow, you can actually make a satisfying artistic life here in San Diego.

Q: So what’s on your wish lists?

Ashley: I would love to do more Shakespeare. (To Edelstein): And do you have a new-play wish?

Edelstein: (I) really want to do a musical. Not now — I’d be terrified. Never done one, but I really want to. And I’ve got my own theater now, so I guess I can do it.

Ashley: You know the right people to talk to to get hired for it! And if you have a new play you’re interested in directing, and want to hear it read, the DNA series is open to you.

Edelstein: You’re sweet to say so! Speaking of which, I don’t know if it’s possible, but we have a big outdoor Shakespeare theater …

Ashley: We could just hire each other. That could be fun. That would kind of blow everybody’s minds a little bit.

Edelstein: Wouldn’t that make everybody crazy? ‘What is he doing THERE?!’

(NOTE: A version of this story will appear in the June 2 edition of the U-T's Sunday Arts.)